Blair: God will judge me on the Iraq war

As a defence of his Iraq policy, you might have expected Tony Blair to make it in the testing surroundings of the Today programme studio or on Newsnight.

Instead, the Prime Minister chose to go on Michael Parkinson's easy-going chatshow, in the less than heavyweight company of pop singer Christina Aguilera and Hollywood luvvie Kevin Spacey.

And tonight ITV1 viewers will see him issue an extraordinary rebuff to opponents of the Iraq war, saying only history and God can judge whether he made the right decision.

Mr Blair dismisses the concerns of critics at home and abroad by asserting that he felt answerable to a higher body than Parliament.

He also discusses his relationships with both Gordon Brown and President Bush - and reveals how he refused to let his father-in-law smoke cannabis in front of him.

However, his decision to talk to 70-year-old Parkinson will do little to improve his reputation for avoiding interviews with more rigorous questioners such as the Today programme's John Humphrys.

Mr Blair has instead allowed himself to be 'grilled' by Des O'Connor, Richard and Judy, This Morning's Fern Britton and Phillip Schofield, the panellists on Football Focus and even Little Ant and Dec, the schoolboy interviewers on ITV's Ant And Dec's Saturday Night Takeaway.

His comments to Parkinson about his faith are certain to generate most interest - and dismay.

Asked about the decision to go to war, Mr Blair says: "That decision has to be taken and has to be lived with and, in the end, there is a judgment.

"If you have faith about these things then you realise that judgment is made by other people . . . by, if you believe in God, it's made by God." He adds: "This is not just a

matter of a policy here or a thing there. . . the only way you can take a decision like that is to try to do the right thing, according to your conscience and for the rest of it you leave it to the judgment that history will make."

Though his religious beliefs are well known, linking his faith so explicitly to the Iraq war is unlikely to go down well in the Middle East. His comments echo Mr Bush's claim that he invaded Afghanistan and Iraq because he was on a ' mission from God'.

The remarks drew criticism from Rose Gentle, whose soldier son Gordon was killed in Basra in 2004. She said she was 'disgusted'.

The Military Families Against the War campaigner said: "How can he say he is a Christian? A Christian would never put people out there to be killed.

"A good Christian wouldn't be for this war. I'm quite disgusted by the comments. It's a joke." She added: "He can find the time to go on Parkinson, but he can't find the time to listen to us."

Sally Keys, mother of Lance Corporal Tom Keys, a Royal Military policeman who was one of six killed by an Iraqi mob in June 2003, said of Mr Blair: "I hope God puts him on a cross and crucifies him."

Her husband Reg said he found Mr Blair's words 'abhorrent'. "God and religion has nothing to do with this war,' he said. "It's about a Prime Minister leading his country to war over a supposed threat.

"It's the 21st century, we no longer fight wars for religion - that was the Crusades. Blair is jumping on the same bandwagon as Bush. Are we really seeing over 100 coffins coming back (to the UK) because God told him to go to war?

"The first judgment should be from the bereaved families, not God."

In the programme, Parkinson

asks Mr Blair when he will leave Downing Street. He replies: "Ah, well, you can't be sure about that but I've said I'd serve a full term and that's what I'll do.

"In the end you've got to judge these things according to the work you've got to do rather than the time you're doing it, and we've got

a busy programme and lots of things to do and I'm getting on with it." He adds: "If I sound embarrassed answering these questions it's because I've spent so long trying to avoid answering them."

Mr Blair discusses his relationship with Gordon Brown. He admits 'politics is very hard to have a friendship in' and hints at the tensions, saying: "There is only one top job and it's not an ignoble ambition to want it, so there's all those difficulties there." But, he insists, the two enjoy a 'good partnership'. "I'm proud to call him a friend and I always will be," he says.

Of Mr Bush, he says: "I find him extremely straightforward to deal with and what he says he does", before admitting that this is 'a minority view'.

Mr Blair also tells how his father-in-law, actor Tony Booth, visited soon after his wedding to Cherie. "He comes into the house and... he says, 'Do you mind if I light a joint?' And I remember thinking, 'This is my father-in-law, this should be the other way round surely?'"

He tells Parkinson that he refused to let Mr Booth smoke cannabis in front of him.